Ex-Marlboro mayor who raped 6-year-old girl: ‘I know I did wrong’

The former mayor of Marlboro has been has been sentenced to 25 years in a Delaware prison for raping a 6-year-old girl several times.

“I stand here at a crossroads in my life,” Matthew V. Scannapieco, 71, said at his sentencing according to the News Journal.  “I know I did wrong. This is something I also have to live with. It’s not something forgotten.”

Scannapieco, who served as Marlboro's mayor from 1992 until 2003, is charged with second-degree rape, first-degree sexual contact, and continuous sexual abuse of a child. He pleaded guilty to the charges in early August.

The current mayor of Marlboro, Jonathan Hornik, ordered Scannapieco's named removed from township property at the time.

"No person in Marlboro should ever again have to read this name in any honored capacity," wrote Hornik on the township Facebook page at the time. The post has since been removed and crews have worked to remove his name from several locations including the recreation center according to the Asbury Park Press.

Scannapieco served time between 2008 and 20010 for taking $245,000 in bribes from a developer, according to the News Journal, and moved to Delaware before serving his time to to get a "fresh start."

He accused of abusing the girl just before starting his sentence in 2008. The girl told her mother about the abuse in 2014.